What has gone before, stories that you have loved

pirate

The moon had not yet set when two ships quietly rounded the headlands of the bay.

Blackfish and Lir slid into the bay under the silent, carefully pulled oars powered from men who pulled the quiet vessels next to two darkened ships.

Darkened, but not asleep.

On board the Wrath and Scorned, crews sat and watched the illuminated ships draw up close, smoking fuses at the ready.

A young man’s voice called out, hailing the dark ships.

“Ahoy.”

And a woman’s voice answered.

“Mon Dash?” Then a squeal of recognition and applause, Annamarie’s favorite youth had returned as promised.

Cheers erupted, sailors stowed the guns and once darkened gunports were closed and sealed. The reunion with adoptive big sisters and their crew erupted in cheers and lamps were lit.

Sunrise found the crews of four-pirate ships deep in conversation.

“Mssr. O’Danu.” The brilliant blue eyes of the French Fille-du-Roi looked happily at Conn. “You are most blessed with such a jeune homme.”

She feasted on eggs gathered from the island the night before.

“I don’t understand, Captain.” Conn said with his head tilted slightly.”

“Emmm… Jeune man.” She repeated, her blond hair spilled over her shoulders. Then thought a moment. “Young man?”

A chuckle from a crewman nearby earned an icy look, silencing him instantly.

Laughter echoed over the morning water, the ships with space enough between them, men in the ropes and masts ready to unfurl canvas at a moments notice.

Stories told, Conn, and the other fathers learned of the children that sailed the small ship that brought them home.

While the peals of laughter and stories were told and laughed about. The one known as “Back-from-the-dead-red” looked around and spotted her most protected of men standing on the bow of the Wrath. She walked up to the youth, a boy when she last laid eyes on him, in the year that passed, he had grown nearly as tall as she was, his shoulders had become broad.

But the one that Annemarie called “Mon Dash!” still stared out over the water with those green eyes that filled her with worry.

The eyes were full of an anger that would haunt her soul for years. A steady, unblinking gaze that wished that his future lay somewhere beyond the horizon. When last they sailed together, she prayed that when this young man reunited with his family, he would find peace.

“Talk to me.” She sat on the bowsprit. “You have been and always shall be my man.” Her voice soft in the daylight and she held his hand.

“My dad and all their crew cannot keep up with us. They are learning how to sail their ship which he built as the same as ours.” He shook his head, blood-colored hair glistened in the sunlight. “Granuaille has drilled the crew of the Blackfish until everyone hates her. But we can load and run out the guns faster than fast. Even Dana has earned his place amongst us.”

“Who, pray tell, is Dana?” Jacquotte asked.

“That would be me.” Icy blue eyes under the hair golden sunshine. The small boy-child, in her eyes stood next to the older and taller captain of the child crew. “I am his brother, what are you doing with him?”

“Your Keegan, is my Dash. He is my man, I have fought beside him and hold him dear in my heart.” She winked, this seemed to relax the younger one. “I will always be by his side.”

“Dash, you did not tell me you had such a handsome brother.” She ran her fingers through the red hair.

“You know him, this was the cabin boy we took off of the ship under the command of Captain Tudor.” The cheeks and lips smiled and had a slight blush, however the green eyes remained haunted. “This is him.”

“This is him? His hair was not nearly as bright yellow, he was shades darker. And he had black fingernails.” Jacquotte clapped. “Mon dieu! You have cleaned up well, cabin-boy.”

“I am not a boy, I am a pirate.” He stood with his hands on his hips.

Coming barely to the woman’s shouldershe slipped her arms around Dana’s shoulders and kissed him on the forehead.

“Any family of my Pirate Prince is welcome aboard any of my fleet.” She laughed while Dana blushed brightly.

“Don’t worry, Dana,” Dash laughed. “She has did that to me and Bradan, when we met.”

The sudden memory of his old friend wiped the laughter from his soul like shadows banished by sunlight.

The tall, redheaded woman stepped up to the one she called Dash and put her arms around him.

To her, he was Dash MacDíoltas, The Son of Revenge.

“You, young Dana.” She brushed a blond hair out of the tow-headed boy. “You would turn a girl’s head quickly.”

“Aww. Ma’am…” Dana started, finding a deeper shade of red to turn.

“Call me Jacquotte, or if you cannot, Captain will be well enough.” She smiled.

“Keegan? Keegan!” Conn’s voice sounded over the deck.

“We must return to the meeting, it seems that the meet and greet is over.” Keegain said to the others.

The trio stood and walked back to the larger group. Jacquotte sadly did not have time to talk to Keegan, her dash of spice in her life. A kindred ginger, this boy with the green eyes, who would replace her lost family.

In the crowd of captains and officers, they drank toasts to each other and greeted the red-headed captain of the fast ship Blackfish.

“We sail at the turn of the tide.” Keegan directed. “We head south, then west. There is a man we need to meet.”

When tide turned and began to withdraw, four ships gracefully rounded the edge of the hidden bay and turned to a southerly course.

Destination: Port Royal.

Captain Henry Morgan would be quite surprised to see that his favorite pirate had returned. However, the return of the children pirates would not go as unnoticed as everyone might hope.

Pirate hunters, given the a charter to find and eliminate any pirates working for the wrong government were on the rise.

In the twenty-first century, they would be called bounty hunters or mercenaries.

The red haired teenage captain of the Blackfish called them one only thing.

Tongs and hammers, wood and copper, iron and wood, the ship took shape in the backwater of the great bay, hidden by the local geography, the ship grew in its lethal shape for a lethal design.

The hull was knife-edged, a keel that resembled the fin of the largest porpoise in the world’s oceans. The Blackfish grew in shape and deadly purpose. Conn O’Danu paced as he directed the carpenters to follow the measurements and drawings to the bitter-end of each page. There would be no gaps, no errors. Conn used green, live oak for the frame and hull of the new ship, stout construction to the extreme. No guesswork allowed, each measurement carefully made by standard marks on flat sticks and small knots on cords.

This pleased Conn, this oak of the new land demonstrated itself as a resilient wood and made for the tightest construction he ever envisioned possible.

In the course of the construction, the men and women adults felt need to build a ship, the urge to build came from Keegan, who reassembled the crew of children that had returned home. Their mission, the small ones had decided, return to the islands in the south and rescue their friends, mothers, fathers and all their families that remained.

The children, parents found, while still children in their bodies, had matured into adults far before their time. The New Model Army took them as babes needing their mothers for slights and scrapes, the children returned as pirates that the naval powers feared. Pint-sized warriors willing to fight and take wounds, to bleed for each other and what they felt as a righteous mission. Mothers and fathers, sadly, took months to learn the precious innocent children were gone forever, replaced by hunters and legends. They were threats to all on the ocean.

The cruelty of the Empires of the world had taught them how to sail and fight. Now, they were punishers of the sea, and to the sea they would return until that which the Empire had stolen were all returned.

Copper and iron metal heated and hammered in place. Diarmuid An Dubh and Nial Gabham, the two talented blacksmiths of the village, made connections to other artisans of metals and the powers of Hephaestus, forged with imagination the plates of copper they attached to the hull of the ship. A ship which they hid in the back-waters of the bay.

Ideas from the boy who brought the children home, copper scales nailed on the bottom of the ship’s hull. Copper nails held the dinner-plate sized copper ellipse shaped scales in place. Brass and bronze nails driven in measured distances by carpenters and craftsmen. The builders who followed what Keegan O’Danu and Dana, who the O’Danu’s had adopted as one of their own, showed where to drive the metal spikes into the wood.

Under the shade of a nearby tree, as word spread, children gathered by ones and twos. They were returning, time for retribution was at hand.

Mothers with fear in their hearts, tried to pull these children who gathered in the clearing. Children, those that had been lost and then returned, who still carried a fire in them that frightened most adults.

Such anger, taught by the Empires of the sea and this New World that they colonized. Taken for slavery and pleasure, a life was worth less than the sweat it took to pull a knife from a sheath.

Fathers pulled on children who turned and looked at the patriarchs in the eye. In the child’s eye, an unwavering fury danced in each of their hearts. The souls of a generation pushed beyond civilized limits, filled instead with the single thought.

Retrieve that which was theirs.

Parents words of denial and demands, spoken of in angered whispers as families tried to rebuild. But no one denied that each family was still rent and torn with missing members.

These were children who learned a mission. Their first mission was to come home.

A new call to arms, a new mission, flames of deep, unremitting anger sparkled in youthful eyes. Confidence that only the young had, and a fury taught equalled only by the devil himself at those who raided their villages.

The followers of Cromwell, the devil of all the crimes against this group of children that despised the soldiers in red and the Rump Parliament who followed after Pride’s Purge. The efforts of a few had instilled such anger in a whole people.

And the growing Empire successfully angered two groups of people to that point in its history.

The Great Scots of the North and the Highlands and the entire Hibernian isle.

The Governor of the colony could not know of the return of a crew of children on a ship that was like no other.

In time, despair would settle over the hearts of Governors and Ministers alike in future days as rumors of the hell-ship, namedBlackfish, a fast and lethal warship that sailed the waters of the West Indies came to their ears.

In her apartment, every moment Kaylee spent outside of class, her computer logged in and a bluetooth connection to her television to watch it with her sister.

Melanie paced around the apartment in agitation. The news website out of Singapore at first uploaded the few still images and fewer videos had no recent enough updates to calm her irritation.

One high-quality video, the news reporter explained that Singapore authorities detained an American, Thomas Harte, while they investigated the charges that he smuggled marijuana bundled for transportation and a bottle of unknown liquid that investigators suspected as a narcotic. Cleared of drug-use by medical examination, the prosecutor planned to use the reports against him in a court and prosecute the United States Citizen as a smuggler.

‟He was cleared by a blood check? How can they use that he was clean against him?” Melanie said.

‟There, it said it. If he had it in possession and he’s clean, they know he was trafficker.” Kaylee held both hands to her tear-streaked face.

‟I’ve called Lettie, she called the government here. I talked with a lawyer that Lettie set me up with, he will set me up with the state department and we will see if there is any help I can do.” Kaylee said.

‟How can you help?”

‟The stash was mine.” Kaylee said. ‟It was in with my massage oil. I know that’s what they are calling as narc-oil.”

‟You left it? In his plane?” Melanie clapped her hand to her forehead. ‟You never planned to stay with Glenn.”

‟I, uh…” Kaylee stammered, then her temper flared. ‟Screw you.”

That just made Melanie the Monster and kid sister laugh harder.

‟You say that and that means I’m right. Tom got you to love him.” She smiled at her sister and poked her older Kaylee over her heart. “He writes about airship pirates, but he is the King of Pirates who stole your heart. Thomas Harte is a thief of hearts.”

‟I’ll need to tell the State Department that Tom and I had gotten married and then annulled.” Kaylee rubbed her forehead. ‟Dad will poop a pinecone.”

‟Yeah, a whole tree of them.” Melanie smiled, but her tone was sad. ‟You know those crazy paparazzi with cameras will be here. You won’t be able to walk or drive to classes.”

‟I’ll live on campus then.”

‟The wait list is two years long, you won’t get a place until after you graduate.” Melanie shook her head. ‟If you tell the State Department, you can save him, but you will lose your chance to graduate in peace. The photographers will be all over you like flies on a dead fish.”

‟What…?” Kaylee interrupted. “Mel, the feed just went down. Just have a four-zero-four ‟Not Found” code.”

‟Just go back a page.”

‟I did, Online Network News only has other countries in the menu, Singapore is not there. Not even weather.”

‟Wierd. Try alternate news feeds.” Melanie suggested and sat next to her sister at the computer.

‟Okay.” Kaylee typed in the addresses of the different sources.

‟Those are old images we’ve seen. Tom might be free. Oh!” Kaylee smiled. ‟Lettie has sent an email.”

Then the excitement turned into crestfallen defeat.

‟She says Tom’s locked up in jail, Singapore police have confiscated his passport. She looked at the laws, sent me the link.” Kaylee clicked on the highlighted text. ‟That is harsh. He might get ten-years for the weed and forfeit all his possessions and death penalty is mandatory for the narc-oil.”

Melanie looked at her sister.

‟Death? But that is only aromatherapy oil, right? That essence of rosemary I gave you for your birthday.” She shook her head. “And they took… His plane?”

Melanie kept reading over Kaylee’s shoulder.

A phone rang, and both sisters looked at their phones before Kaylee picked it up.

‟Yeeaah… I would leave the jacket.” Melanie said and looked out the window. ‟It’s too hot to dress in those extra layers.”

‟Yeah. Yeah… I will meet with some important people, I don’t want them to think I am just a college kid.”

‟Well. You are, and he is a lot older, you might not get away without that label in their minds, then they would say it.” Melanie mused as she helped her sister adjust the collar on the blouse.

‟I don’t know what to say.” Kaylee said and walked out of the room. ‟The lawyer will be here in a moment.”

‟Okay. Okay.” Melanie said as the sibling turned around. ‟Okay, you look good. Wait, did you put a bra on?” Another squeak of profanity from her Kaylee who disappeared into her room again.

A short few minutes and she was ready. The sisters opened the door to walk down to the sidewalk and both sisters screamed in surprise.

Four men stood in the hallway, two in military uniform in places on either side of the door. Two in civilian office clothing, one looked like he had swallowed some vile drink.

‟Miss Grant?” The dark-skinned man held out a hand. ‟I’m Beyron Ferguson, attorney at law. The G.I. Joe here is the secretary of the local state department office, Maxwell Silverham.” he indicated the sour-faced man.

‟Local?” Melanie said. ‟I didn’t know we had a local one.”

‟And you are?” Beyron said.

‟She is my sister, Melanie Grant. I would like to have her here while you interrogate me. Should I get a lawyer?”

‟Please call me Max.” The older white-haired man said. ‟No you don’t need a lawyer, and local is a relative term Miss Grant.” He nodded with a smile to Melanie.

‟May I get you a glass of water?” Kaylee asked.

‟No, thank you.” Max said. ‟May we sit?”

Motioning to the breakfast table, they all took a seat while Beyron pulled out a notepad.

‟For the record Miss Grant… Kaylee. I am your attorney, appointed by the Attorney General of the United States, pro-bono. That is no charge to you.” Beyron explained to the two women. “I will give you advice, but I will do what you ask, even finding a replacement if I do not fulfill my job to your satisfaction. Mister Silverham here is the government investigator in charge. He would like to ask about your relationship with Thomas Harte who is now in custody in Singapore and will stand trial for drug possession in the next few days. This is not a criminal investigation, but I am here to protect your rights in any event his questions stray into private areas that are not relevant. If at any time you wish to stop talking with Mister Silverham, we will bring this to an end. Do you understand all that?”

Kaylee nodded.

‟Before we start,” Max said, ‟What is your relationship with this author who seems to lack a street address.”

Kaylee held hands with her sister and relaxed, she felt more confident than ever and explained the events of the past summer.

Kaylee finished dressing while Tom pulled on his clothes in awkward silence.

“Why are you mad at me?” Tom said as they walked across the tarmac to the flight control office.

“If you don’t know, I’m not going to tell you.” Her words chilled the air.

Tom rolled his eyes in that way that drives women crazy and would turn Mother Theresa into a club wielding banshee if she had seen it.

Half-way from the office in the three-hundred meter hike, Kaylee started to laugh and took Tom’s hand.

“I’m sorry. But I kind of thought you would be a little heartbroken.” She smiled. “I was hurt you are just okay with it.”

“Kaylee, no, I’m not okay with it.” Tom said as they walked through the door. “But, if I trapped you here, what good would that do? You’d leave anyway and never return. My way, it stings like a slap, but you might decide that you like life on the Pacific Wizard and the need to renew your passport once-a-decade.”

“Renew my passport? What do you mean?”

“You can’t leave home without it. If we went anywhere, like the U.K. to watch Doctor Manga’s installation for example, you will need that silly-assed bit of paper and plastic.”

“Hm. I don’t know, Tom. You make me feel…”

The clerk walked in and Tom pulled a form from the slot and began to fill in the blanks.

They finished the paperwork in ten-minutes, filed with the person behind the desk and walked out, Kaylee felt a pang of sadness when Tom took her hand as they walked back to the Flying Sea Dragon.

“I’m serious, Kaylee. I don’t want to see you go. But there is an old poster about a butterfly or a bird or something, you let it go and if it returns, et-cetera.”

“Yeah. Who knows. Maybe Glenn needs to tell me he is gay and everything is off, because he is in love with some guy named Joe Young or something.”

“We talked about this, I don’t want to think I’m a consolation prize. You make me smile wide because you are my wife.” Tom smiled at her. “But I laugh because I am your husband.”

“No riddle. I smile because I got such a great treasure, if I can count you as such, and in comparison, you got the joke prize. I got a better deal by far out of this whole situation than you did.”

Tom laughed out loud at this.

For a moment, Kaylee pondered what he had said.

Then she began to laugh.

“Tom, you are the treasure. Never say otherwise.” She kissed his hand and continued to swing it in hers.

“Yeah. Ain’t ever going to happen. I’m just a writer, I am not a treasure. You are the gem in this relationship. I’m a damaged diamond, a shattered sapphire, a pulverized pearl, a…”

“Okay, enough. And you are not.” Kaylee said pulling on his hand as they got close to the big jet. “You have had more sorrow than anyone should be allowed, but you are awesome. You make me draw and paint. You keep me turned on, creatively speaking.”

“I thought…” Tom was winking like a dirty old man in a bar.

“Shh. I am being serious and trying to tell you my heart, you are trying to make a joke.”

“Sorry.”

“Men are all alike.”

“Well. Yeah. We’re married at the moment, I’m supposed to act like that, it’s in the rule book.”

“You are changing the subject.” She growled at him. “Is this bothering you?”

“Yeah, you could say that.”

“Okay, well, I would like to go back to my old life, but it is not going to happen. You have already spoiled me.”

“That is a good job, spoiling you. Glenn will have to work that much harder.” Tom said as they approached the Sea Dragon.

“You have raised the bar high on that.”

“I hope so.”

“Where are we going now?” Kaylee asked as Tom walked past the steps going up to the door of the jet.

“Over here to the service office on the far side of the hanger. I need to do a couple of things. first is to make sure the payment for the services is complete and two, that the inspection by the FAA officer clears the Dragon for flight. I want to go over it together with him and make sure that nothing falls off the yacht while we are airborne, that would go into the bad column.”

“What if we took a commercial flight?”

“We could, but then we would be at the mercy of the commercial operators and TSA officers that are tasked with complex jobs that now take hours what used to take minutes when our grandparents traveled. Back in the day of Humphry Bogart and Casablanca.”

“I wish it would be like that. I could so make a charcoal of that.”

“How long would it take you?”

“I… I don’t know, why do you ask?”

“Well, I need to find that pain in my neck FAA agent or we have to charter a plane, or we have to buy tickets and wander over to the terminal and be tourists in Vegas. It may take hours to do that last part, just to leave on a commercial airline, so you might go do some drawing?”

“And leave the business to you while I entertain myself? Hardly, Mr. Harte. I am not just along for the ride, I will help you make this happen, even if it is my choice— right or wrong. I control my destiny.”

“One day, Missus Harte, you will be in charge of your own house of beauty, painting and sculpture. You will be an artist in demand.” Tom nodded. “You have the attitude.”

“Right? Just for now, I have to finish another year of college, get my business admin minor out of the way. Melanie will help me, we keep each other balanced with life’s challenges.”

“I would like to get to know Melanie better.” Tom smiled.

“Tom, do you plan to replace me, already?”

“Heh. No.” He back-pedaled quickly. “She just sounds like a good friend to have. And she likes my movie.”

“Oh, you don’t know the half of it. She is a true fan and in love with some of your characters. The airship pirates, some of the princes. Her costume for Halloween last year was the red-headed pirate princess, I can’t remember the character’s name.”

“Julia Aquila.”

“Yeah! That’s it, Melanie makes a good Princess Aquila.”

“SteamLand is fun to write.”

“Is? It’s not finished?”

“Heck-no. There are lots of adventures for the Sky-Pirate empire to deal with.” Tom smiled with the memory of writing the novel series.

Kaylee woke up the next morning, with stiff and tired muscles. Her thighs burned so bad that it was painful just to move her legs. She threw one leg across the sleeping Tom, making him snuffle when she moved. It was sweet to her ears and she smiled at the sound.

She had all but wore him out, he was weak and out of shape from being in a hospital bed for the previous two weeks and not allowed to move his arm.

Inside he heart she laughed, Kaylee enjoyed being stronger than Tom. She had pushed him down and made him enjoy himself equal to the number scenes of drama in their lives.

Just one thing tickled her mind and she was not sure if it pleased her or not. He kept whispering her name in absent-minded ways, sometimes he used her married name “Kaylee Harte”, as if he enjoyed the flavor of it.

At least it wasn’t some other woman’s name, although warmth on how he said the words caused sparks inside of her.

Pleasure or sadness she could not make up her mind. But if anything, she was not going to stay with Tom and prove Georgia correct that she stayed with him because of his money and fame. If anything, now it was a motivation to her to depart and go back to her old life. No one would insinuate or call her such vile names.

But, for now, she was happy that Tom held her in his heart — at least by name.

Kaylee kissed his chest and he, well he didn’t snore- precisely. But she disturbed him and the snort/snore echoed in the small room. He inspired her, and her inspiration wanted to draw.

Her inspiration? The author of such a children’s series of adventure-picture books with a moral in each story about sharing, hero decisions that even a child could make.

To stand up against authority if danger exists. The right and wrong choices of the fictional leafy sea dragon made were an adventure to children of all ages and sold well to his target audiences.

Then his creative works became movies of steampunk. Kaylee felt that he had a romantic soul in him for that genre, something that would let his pain out and make him smile with his heart as much as his face.

Since she had known him, she had felt that his heart was little more than a bleeding scar from the wounds inflicted by life.

And she put some of bloody scar there.

She remembered she hurt him. He never admitted it. But she hurt his heart and his soul.

Quietly, as she listened to his heart beat, a tear slipped out of her left eye when Kaylee wished she had not signed and sent off the papers.

Even an accident that it was, as a husband Tom showed himself as a higher quality of husband than any she could have dreamed of.

And he helped her to annul the relationship on her request.

So why did she cry?

Slowly, carefully, she disentangled herself from Tom. He mumbled something that sounded like her name, then slipped back into the fuzzy, comfortable arms of sleep.

The cool air of the flying boat made the stiff muscles in her legs ache as she walked the full length of the plane, in his pirate jammy-pants that hung down to her mid-calf and a skull and crossed pistol t-shirt that hung to past her thighs. If someone was in the right position to look into the front wind-screen of the jet, they would have seen her moving through the big jet wearing his clothes.

Although Tom was sleeping well, Kaylee wanted to eat something and softly padded on her bare feet into the galley.

Opening the small refrigerator she felt the chilled air spill over her feet like a flood. This made her grin, she was going to warm them up on Tom when she crawled back in bed.

Her thighs ached in fatigue in the dawn-twilight of the day and instead of bending her legs, she bent over and looked for a carrot or an apple to get a bite of.

Suddenly, she felt a hand on her back, with a swat on her (and sticking out, unprotected) backside.

Yipping and standing up suddenly, she hit her head on the handle of the overhead freezer.

‟TOM! You startled me.”

‟You think that was a surprise? You are lucky it was just my hand.” He grinned. ‟Besides, what you have is in my jammies and the skull and crossbones could to not be missed. I probably could bounce a coin off it from across the room.” Tom squeezed her around the waist in a firm hug.

‟Tom. Stop the fantasy, we are at breakfast.” She said, standing with a carton of milk.”

‟Okay, I guess I’ve already had dessert.”

‟You have had enough dessert for three men.” She laughed. ‟For now, I need some fuel for my engine.”

‟Come back to bed. We don’t have much time left.”

‟I’m going to eat, I can make you something. Some exotic art-college food perhaps?” Kaylee looked around. ‟Hm… red wine, chocolate, vanilla beans, vodka— why do you have vodka here? Coffee, pomegranates, how long have these been here? ‟

Kaylee picked one of the red fruits out of a basket slung under one of the cabinets.

‟Banana, apple… I have plenty to work with. Chocolate and red wine to start. Later, I am going to make a pomegranate-chocolate snack later.

‟That’s a lot of chocolate.”

‟I’ll show you things to do with chocolate that will change your mind. You’ll want more.”

‟I already want more.” Tom said, moving papers off the small table in the galley, taking them to his work-station. ‟Are these the papers you signed?”

‟Those are the copies. I sent the originals off. Please, Tom, put those away and let’s enjoy the last of our time as a married couple.” Kaylee said while she set the breakfast table.

‟Did you sign both sets?” Tom said as he was flipping through the annulment forms. ‟You signed this one.”

‟Yes, I signed them both the same way at the same time.

‟Same exact way?”

‟Same exact places, both sets, why?”

Tom coughed, then laughed.

‟You signed these papers in the wrong places.” He nodded as he flipped though the form. ‟Yup. The clerk of the court will reject this filing.”

Tom laughed at Kaylee ‘s jaw-drop moment.

“We are still married.” His crooked smile let her know he enjoyed this.

The young man sat on the overturned bucket with a quill in one hand, a book in his lap. He leaned in his favorite corner, eschewing the captain’s chair at the desk.

The Blackfish was making way nicely, and his view of the ocean from the stern of the ship made his soul feel free with the expansive view when the storm doors were open.

His long crimson hair, cut above his ears months before, now hung down past his ear lobes, dipped the tip of the quill in the jar of ink and put the blackened tip to the parchment.

“Captain’s Personal Log:

This is the first voyage of the Blackfish, and my father follows in the Fearg. A sister ship to this one. We have come here to this spot from a journey that started years ago.

Nearly half my life.

A summer day when my father went out with a ship that he had built. He was gone when the English came and destroyed my village.

I saw my seanathair lay on the ground with a bolt from his manubalista jutting out of his chest and the soldiers that beat my mam into the dirt until she stopped moving. In those days, I thought she was dead.

I woke up on a slave-cart, I still carry the scar, hidden by my hair, where the soldier hit me.

When I came home, I found that my mam, taken by the English, was in the islands where Captain Christopher Myngs freed myself and my friends.

I found when I returned to my father in the Virgina lands of a bay they called Irishtown. A backwater behind a Dutch settlement.

I sit in command of this new ship, a crew of twenty and one hundred of the old crew. Only twelve adults serve on board. The older’s follow us, in the ship of my father’s design.

We return in force, with my old friends Anna God-Wants and Jacquotte Delahaye to find my mother, somewhere on the islands of the Caribs.

I will not rest until I find my mother’s fate and return her home, if I can.

I cannot watch my father walk as a man alone any longer, he weeps at night for the life stolen from him, he believes I do not see. But he is my father, I hear him at night, I see his eyes. The strain shows on his face.

This is not tolerable on a personal level.

My friends all have parents, brothers and sisters all still missing and we will return to collect them.

The Blackfish and the other ships can carry twice more than the crew who man them. Plus my plan will be to take ships on our return home.

Empires will tremble at the thought of our rescue. No navy will prevail against us. We have new bronze cannon built by the one my father called Francois Buile. He showed us that the ranges of the nine-pounders are near double of our last guns.

Granuaile has turned carriages of the guns into inventions of her own design. Adult men have learned to keep their distance from her.

My only pleasure around her, she has stopped socking me in the shoulder. My bruise is almost healed, but any man who hits me there now, will have a surprise. Unless he has hands of stone, I would not notice it.”

The ginger-haired youth rubbed his shoulder and laughed at his own humor. Looking out over the water, the old melancholy chased away the smile.

Putting the quill into the bottle, he stood up and walked to the expensive glass window. An artisan, commissioned by the blacksmiths, made three cut-glass letters to remind a woman’s child of her name.

“Fey” in small colored cut-glass gems sparkled in the sun, it burned in his soul to see it.

Tracing his fingers over the inlay, the old anger rose again. He would get her back. They meant it as a gift to calm a soul, instead, it was a fan that increased the rage in his heart.

Sitting again, he picked the quill out of the bottle and tapped the drop off against the mouth of the blown-glass bottle of ink and put it to the expensive vellum in his personal journal.

Turning the page, he wrote at the top of the page:

“Captain’s Personal log of Keegan O’Danu

I miss her, I can remember my mam’s eyes and her laugh. I was only nine-summers old when we were taken. I will find her and bring her back, if only for my athair. A son should never see a father broken. Slavery should never be a market and I will free anyone that is in service against their will that I find, so long as I draw a breath. Slave ships will be my prey, anyone who flies the flag of empire will strike colors on my approach.

The Pirate Kingdom of the Sea will hold sway. Free people will embrace the name.

Everywhere they use the label pirate as a pejorative, I will embrace it as freedom.

Until my Mam is home, I will walk the decks and sail the seas until I am too old to chew my food.

Many years ago, to me.

My máthair was taken.

The English declared war on our village.

Today, I return to get her back. The Spanish, English and any who strike with the might of an empire, just because they can, I will make tremble with fear to sail these waters with their flags flying.

My father and his crew accompany us in thinking they protect the children.

We are the seeds of crimes that the Spanish, English, Dutch have sown.

It us up to the children to protect the fathers.

I will continue to use my war-name given to me by the Quartermaster of the Marston Moor.”

A member since the first tour on Grampus she had no fear of anyone, Beth Angelcries stepped through the door.

“Keegan, your Da’ is pulling up along side and using the speaking-trumpet that Nial the smith made.”

Nodding, the captain of the Blackfish looked up into the hazel eyes of the girl who had shown such fury when they made their way home, causing Keegan to redefine the term in his mind.

Looking down, he finished his entry.

With the support of Anna Marie and Jacquotte we will stop at the harbor of Germantown and meet with those children who stayed behind and were adopted when we left their village last year for the Chesapeake.

The adults in that town invited us to return when we wished. It is something I do wish to do, there is a debt of help I owe to the families there.

Setting down his quill, the youngest captain in any fleet walked to talk with his personal hero.

The Doctor demanded to know what was happening as he and several nurses joined the rush as they all ran down the hall with half the black clad group in front and the balance covering their escape when the Doctor finally got his question answered.

“Star Empire has attacked the station. There were news releases that the vaccine is a genocide poison against their people.” The redheaded leader of the group answered. “We arrived here to meet with the science and medical teams to show the vaccine was not toxic and meet with investigators of the merchantman attack. Those people who arrived are soldiers, not doctors or scientists. Three Buccaneer ships intercepted the attacking ships, but the Empire ships outnumbered them and they have fallen back to the far side of the planet. The soldiers have made it into the station and have taken control of elevator command center.”

“They caught my fleet in the ambush when the hidden ships set off anti-matter charges.” He shook his head. “I have word that Captain P’ak Sitron was fast enough to change the vector and headed out into deep space to stop the fleet safely. But that will make it two or three hours before they can regroup and return, ready for battle. By then, the Empire will be in place, barricaded and in control.”

Blasters came out as they made a corner. One of the black group pulled out a baseball sized object and rolled it down the hallway.

“Close your eyes.” The warrior said to her rolling a glittering, round crystal around the corner into the corridor, then called “Fire in the hole!”

Phoenix closed her eyes just as a silent flash in rapid sequence illuminated so brightly that her eyes were able to see shadow through her eyelids and she would later swear that she could see the bones in her hands that covered her eyes.

A strong hand grabbed her shoulder and propelled her past the point where several people were laying on the ground vomiting and holding their eyes.

“What kind of bomb was that?” She asked no one in particular as they ran down the hallway, explosions followed by a gust of wind in their faces.

“Breach! Hull breach!” Called an obvious human. Of African descent like the doctor, this warrior was shorter than Phoenix but powerfully built, he grabbed the others and dragged them through a doorway and slammed his hand down on an emergency close button and the shrieking wind stopped with everyone’s ears popping.

Through the clear door, Phoenix could see several people sucked around the corner of the last intersection hallway and out of sight.

“That will work against the strike force, they brought that issue on themselves, the Empire has violated every treaty possible just now.” Said the red-headed leader.

“Sir! We can’t get to the transport. We have to find another way off the port.” Phoenix saw on the chest of the man who had pulled her through the hatch wore a name tag “Garr-id”.

“Escape through the utility access. Rhea! Take the civilians to the ship.”

“You have your orders, now go, these people are non-combatants and do not need to suffer through this. We will meet you at the ship and give you cover, when you are in we will join you.”

A growl like that which Phoenix had never heard from someone before nearly made her laugh, it might have been even comical in another time and circumstance, but now all she did was stare.

Through a small hatch that was quickly sealed behind them and by the sound of debris piled over the access port, hidden.

Rhea and the half-dozen doctors, nurses and former patients ran, crawled, climbed and balanced carefully on pipes as they made their way down the access tunnel towards a destination that Phoenix did not know.

Through the conduits and ventilation systems, sounds of gunfire and high-pitched whine of energy weapons and people screaming dug into Phoenix’s brain.

Rhea held a finger up to her lips as she stopped the group, a low hum from the pipes made their skin tingle. She pressed her ear up against a hatch that looked much like any other, then nodded. Pulling a small flat rectangle out of her belt she pulled a cord from the small palmtop electronic equipment and plugged it into a port next to the hatch.

Phoenix and the others watched as Rhea tapped the screen a few times then a holographic projection appeared over the top of the device showing a hangar door and the hallway was clear. A few more touches and she explained about recording the empty hallway for a few seconds worth.

Rhea smiled and put her hand against the lever of the service hatch and pushed it open and pointed the device at the video sensor.

“Out! OUT! Everyone.” She said in a loud whisper. “Through that door and step to the left and wait for me.”

When the last of the medical team was through the door, Rhea took a bound step and was through the hangar door.

“That last was the most hazardous.” Rhea explained to the group. “They could have seen us, but I blinded the camera for a moment. Okay, to the ship. Quietly, single file behind me.”

The ship was slightly silver-blue in color, Phoenix touched the hull as she walked and it felt like nothing she had ever touched, almost plastic or an oily covering, her fingers came back clean, but they tingled slightly as if from an electric current.

Rhea motioned the people inside and got them seated as she communicated quietly on her headset.

“We are in. Hallway was clear, video camera disabled.” She reported.

“We are already here.” Said the Redhead as the second group appeared from around the corner and through the door. “You are getting slow in your old age.”

The other men half-dragged both the leader and two others who had injuries. It was obvious they had a rough go of it. The smaller ship rocked on the deck as the space port experienced to another impact of heavy weapons fire, only this time red lights lit up and began to flash rapidly.

“Someone finally got the defense systems working.” Thought Phoenix.

In the back of the small ship, Garr-id started pulling at the RedHead’s cloak and armor. “Get this off you, Sir, I have to view your wounds.”

“I’m okay.” RedHead groaned, “It’s a bruise, nothing got through. Next timesomeone make sure I’m standing next to a softer wall? Take care of Lieutenant Muir, we have to get this crate launched and out of here to safety, that’s the priority now. We don’t get out of here, your skills with inflicting pain while fixing us will be moot.”

Standing up, the chest had a darkening bruise over the right shoulder. On his back, a large tattoo that was partly hidden by the undershirt, but what Phoenix could see was similar to the markings on all the armor, a bruise growing over his right shoulder-blade. Whatever had knocked this leader down had taken a toll through the armor.

“Sir,” Doctor Concord stood up, “I have had combat medical experience. I am a trauma surgeon, I can help.”

Garr-id looked at the doctor with a quick eye and smiled, “Thanks Doc, I can use you, come here and….” the voices trailed off to the back of the ship as they assessed the other team members condition.

“Rhea, pre-flight emergency launch checks. Let’s get the hell out of here asap. But do it quietly with minimal use of power until the last moment. We don’t want to alert them that we are here. Change the ship markings to that of something more general, a merchant or something.”

Phoenix raised her hand and spoke up.

“Excuse me, but the port defense systems are up— the red emergency lights are up and flashing.”

RedHead looked out the window.

“Good! Thanks! The strike team would not want those systems up, that means one of the control rooms are still in control of the facility. They are fighting back.”

Pressing a few illuminated panels and tapping in a sequence on the panel and a video display came up.

“Foenicks! Good to see you are in control of things.” RedHead laughed into the display. “I’ll keep this short- you look like you are a bit busy.”

“Your gift for understatement would be funny at another time. But we have them contained for the moment. The captain of the transport had called ahead and alerted us that something was up, we just did not know where. We assumed they headed towards the planet.” Fenicks, a tiger-striped face that was bleeding out his nose and one eye was swollen but not shut. “Boru- they are demanding where you are from those that they grab. We have video of them abandoning hallways to follow your direction of travel until they lost you. You are their target Your Majesty.”

“All the more reason to get out of here. Can you give a hand on that?” Boru asked quietly.

“We have decompression problems all over the station, we might have a control problem on hangar door number-5. Yes, yes, I think the controls are overloading and we might have an explosive decompression. Anything in there will be sucked out into space towards the planet.”

“Copy that, Commander Foenicks. We will watch for signs of decompression in about a minute.”

Phoenix looked around and out the ports, no single digit numbers were on any of the doors. There were 21 through 26.

Rhea spoke up. “Pre-flight checks done. We are ready to launch. All power is routed through shielded circuitry.”

“Okay everyone, get your restraints clipped and hold on, we are doing an explosive launch through door two-six.” Boru said. “Rhea, when we move use thrusters only, just keep us from hitting the edges. Let’er drift for a bit once we clear the cloud. No power to the engines, life support or any lights until the last minute.” Turning around and looking at the ex-patients and medical providers, “Folks, it’s going to get bumpy and cold! You civilians will find blankets over your head. If you get cold? Don’t hesitate to use them, but wait until after we finish bouncing around if possible.”

A shockwave slightly rocked the small ship as door “two-six” blew off it’s track and the atmosphere blew it out. Debris, another small ship slid towards the breach, airtight doors closed around the hangar.

Rhea gently tapped the thruster controls and just gave enough spin to the ship so it rotated out the door directly at the planet appearing to have no control.

The smaller unmanned ship hit the side of the hangar door and split off the starboard engine. Spilling fuel and atmosphere it gained speed and rotation, angling towards the escapees’ ship.

“EVADE!” called Boru as he jumped into the pilot seat next to Rhea. “Z-minus one-hundred. Let’s see if we can keep our cover that was not much of a move.”

Using thrusters only, the ship just sidestepped the spinning debris.

“Passive sensor’s have picked up– SIRE! We’ve been painted with target beacons. We have multiple bogies at multiple vectors coming in from all upper altitudes.” The one with the name badge Timate called out.

Phoenix heard the term, it piqued her curiosity.

“Thems not bogies— thems bandits! Okay, cover’s blown! Cloak the ship, let them lose us in the debris.”

Negative G-forces pulled upward on Phoenix, the only thing holding her down was the multi-point restraints that automatically tightened slightly holding her in place as the ship dropped sharply into the cloud of blown out debris. The ship shook with a concussion.

“They have us! Four Titan A6-T’s” A blond warrior with a at a weapons console that Phoenix did not get the name of.

“Emergency dive! Into the atmosphere. Target the lead ship with pulse cannon.” Boru ordered.

The ship rattled with cannon’s rapid fire. Bolts of particle energy struck the first attacker who dissolved into photons and sparks.

“Three more, we are in the atmosphere boundary, we will be visible!” Garr-id yelled.

“Keep going, we’re outgunned up by the spaceport.” Boru looked up and then at the his displays, “Prepare to abandon ship!”

The outside the ship began to heat by the entry into the surrounding atmosphere of Aquila Nova as they sailed at hypersonic speeds into the atmosphere below.

“Drop the cloak, SIre?” Called Rhea

“No no, we need to fake them out a bit longer. Prepare to jettison empty escape pods two through six in half second intervals. Then the rest of you take the last of the pods and abandon ship. I’ll take the ship back up into space while still cloaked. They will think we broke up on reëntry for a moment or two, long enough for you folks to get away.” Rhea started to protest but Boru held up a finger, “You are the Captain, but I outrank you, the civilians will need you to fend for them, until I am able to draw the Empire ships off.”

Rhea grumbled acceptance and went back to the controls and primed the empty pods for jettison without shielding as the ship rocked with more hits.

“Jettison pods two through six!” Boru yelled from his pilot seat. “Everyone in escape pods seven through twelve and deploy on my mark.”

Rhea directed the Doctor back to the seat next to Phoenix, a sudden jerk and the seats backed up an arm’s length and a door slid over the void left by their movement.

“Oh damn, I had forgotten how much I hate this.” Doctor Concord growled. “If I live through this, remind me to schedule that pirate to get his colon scoped with a reamer.”

“Pirate?” She asked.

“Yes, don’t you know? That’s why they are after him– he is Boru U’Maille, the Pirate King. He and his father drove them back in the last wars and forced the peace treaty” Dr. Concord tried to force a smile. “He is a thorn in their side. A big one.”

“THAT is the Pirate King? It must be a mistaaaaaaAAAA…..” Phoenix’s scream mixed with Dr. Concord’s as the ship made a violent roll and ejected the escape pod out at an angle, they did an arc instead of straight line and the motion was enough for Phoenix’s stomach to rise in her throat. She thought she was about to dump her churning stomach on the Doctor.

The autopilot of the pod took over and they rapidly slowed down, banked into a steep angle. Several lights lit up on panels.

“Don’t bother asking, the computer is not interactive, it is just telling us where we are going.” Dr. Concord said. “They will have all the escape pods land close to each other.”

The Doctor did not lie, the pods had landed and the cloaking shimmered and faded as the escapee’s exited and took account of each other.

Rhea looked around as others came out of the trees where a couple of the pods missed the landing area by a few dozen yards.

“King U’Maille is not here.”

Timate, Phoenix could see him well now, an older warrior with stripes on his shoulders as he walked towards Rhea. “He will be here when he can. The bandits were still trying to stalk the pods. I don’t think they were fully convinced that the ship broke up on reentry.””We are near enough to go to the meeting place, besides, I am hungry.”

“I want to sit someplace that doesn’t move,” One of the wounded warriors limped up on his feet. “Or have someone shooting at me.”

Four ships rocked quietly in harbor at twilight. Captains and First Mates sat on a small meadow that overlooked the small fleet of predators below, the moon, three-quarters full was already illuminating the horizon. It would be a brightly lit night. No stealth would be possible from the east. The smoke from the cooking fire below, on the lee side of the volcanic rockfall, between boulders half the size of their ships made for a natural chimney. Used by the sailors as a kitchen, the flow of the air dissipated smoke among the rocks and hills, masking their presence to any lookout on the water.

A short hike with the food in hand, the crews assembled stone and wood benches and tables that allowed them to see to all points of the compass to more than twenty-five miles.

Two women sat at either side of the red-headed Keegan who was clearly tense with the attentions of the two women pirates.

“I think I should sit on the other side of the table.” Causing even his father to laugh.

“Keegan, we need you to stay slower on the ship.” Conn said as they ate a dinner. A bottle of ale sat, the adults pouring and laughing while they ate the evening meal later than planned.

“Da’…” Keegan O’Danu started to complain.

“Dash,” Anna “God Wants” spoke softly. “you vasseau… boat… ship… is more rapide tha’ mienne.” Her French accent slightly enhanced by the copious ethanol in the new ale donated by her last visit on the Spanish Treasure fleet. Annemarie, once one of the Fille du Roi, sent to the Caribbean because she was disruptive in the King’s Court, and still did not have that small voice most people have when it came to speaking her mind.

“You must reduce the sails you set so we can keep up.” She leaned over and kissed him on the cheek, setting his ears ablaze with heat.

Captain Delahaye laughed and talked with the muscular first-mate with dark-eyes, playing with her hair while he poured her more ale from his pitcher.

Dana looked at his brother with one eyebrow raised.

“What is going on with her?”

Keegan shook his head and looked at his father for guidance, the elder O’Danu laughed.

“That, my boys, is the age-old mating ritual.” Looking at their puzzled faces. Keegan looked alarmed when the sailor reached out and touched the bright-red hair of the pirate captain.

“She will kill him.

“Perhaps.” Conn said with a crooked grin. “But not in the way you think. Come with me, let’s start talking about what our plans are from here. Leave those two be for now.”

“But… but…” Keegan still did not comprehend.

“That bruise on your shoulder?” Conn asked his son while they walked to the fire, around which the other captains sat in the hidden grove of trees and tall rocks.

“Yes?” Keegan said. It had mostly healed, Granuaille did not sock him so much after they were away from each other so long at sea. “It still hurts, but it is no longer the color of the midnight sky.”

Conn laughed at his young sons quandary of the attentions of a girl. Here was a young man who could sail around the world, but did not know the first thing about romance of the heart.

The three O’Danu’s sat in the circle with the other captains and officers.

“Where est Jacquotte?” Anna asked, then screamed. “DELAHAYE!”

“OUI?!” The answering voice echoed. “Je viens!”

Finally, when all eight members of crews sat, with other crew sitting behind, paying rapt attention.

“The treasure fleet comes through in the next fortnight, they are punctual, but the ships from Campeche had difficulty with Morgan again.” Jacquotte winked. “So I predict that they will be on the far edge of the fortnight and sailing direct. They risk the storm season and will not waste time trying to hide during the day and sail only at night. This time, maybe they carry silver or gold, not chocolate.”

“Even under full sail,” Keegan said, his red-hair glinting in the firelight. “We can catch them.”

“Est malavisé, em… unwise.” Anna shook her head. “They catch us in open daylight without surprise, the war-galleons will stand and fight. Big Spanish canon are bad to face. We must catch them with their guns stowed and guard down.”

“We can catch them in the dark. In a fortnight, the moon will be on the wane.” Keegan said. “But still too bright, nightwatch will see anyone coming close.”

“Broken clouds would help.” Dana spoke up, then looked down when every eye turned towards him.

“We cannot depend on that.” Conn looked at Dana. “Weather is on thing that we can only take advantage of.”

“Da’.” Keegan said, defending his brother. “He knows.”

Jacquotte spoke up.

“We will speed up the chance to catch them on the first leg of the journey. Not far from where they depart, there is a small harbor, we can put ships there and in another harbor. When the war-galleon’s turn to fight the chasers, the treasure ship will run ahead.”

“Into the hunters.” Conn shook his head. “Is this how you always work?” The father asked the son.

“Often, Da’.” Keegan’s voice was soft. “We just followed.”

“I do not approve, we are here to retrieve your mother.” Conn looked around. “You said you would help us find his mother.”

“Monsieur O’Danu,” Anna looked at him evenly. “This est how our life est. We make the living from what we take, and the Empires we take from deserve no less.”

Few times in his life did Keegan O’Danu see his father truly frown. This being one of those times.

“We are on a mission to seek my mother.” Keegan said, in defense of his sire’s disappointment. “I will not be distracted with the hunt of a treasure ship. My Da’ has never taken a ship, he builds them.”

“And fine ships they are, too!” A voice behind Jacquotte sounded.

“We go to Port Royal first. No stopping until we get there after we leave here. You can gather crews and a fleet then.” Keegan spoke with his old edge. “My mother awaits, my father will seek to rescue her, but he will not fight in any combat.”

Jacquotte turned to Anna and pulled on her left earlobe and took a breath.

“The son protects the father. It is upside-down, the son is the warrior, the father is the peacemaker.” She looked Anna directly in the eye. “Père O’Danu est brebis among wolf.”

Shaking her head, the blond French Captain nearly wept.

“Monsieur O’Danu, you stay at Port Royal and get to know our friends. Mon Dash will come with us, we will bring your épouse back to Port Royal.”

This was the best news that Conn heard, but not the news he wanted to hear.

The Thunderbolt fired upon the first Momo ship, the engines of the Buccaneer Co-op’s great battleship flared under a gang-start into full power. An attempt by the Momo battleship to fire on the Thunderbolt was abruptly ended by the Lightning. With a sudden charging of weapons. The high energy discharge flared violet to blue to deep-blue as the frequencies built up. A cold shot against the shields of the MoMo destroyer, changing frequencies in milliseconds as it warmed-up while it was brought to bear against the warship.

The Momo lead ship Destructor lit up in sparkles of overloaded conduits and melted armor as the ship took disabling damage, the Buccaneer Consortium Lightning lived up to the name given to it when it was designed and built, the energy discharge became the first use of the weapon in the history of warfare.

The Buccaneer battle ship, ThunderChild, sped towards the hostile ships firing a Singularity class torpedo at Empire’s Hammer. On contact with the enemy ship, the weapon absorbed all the energy of the shielding while the Thunderbolt charged its massive rotary canon, a ten-barreled helical rail gun, taking aim at the Power Cubed, a fighter-carrier before it de-cloaked, surprising the Empire ship that its camouflage was ineffective against the Buccaneer close-combat ship.

In the abandoned exam room, Phoenix called her ship, telling them to send a distress call for the port. Ducking a shattered air plenum and hanging ceiling panels, she could hear hissing of high pressure gas leaking in the hallway when she saw them through the transparent walls.

A group of men and women dressed in red and black surrounding a tall male with shoulder-length red hair, came moving quickly down the hallway at the opposite end and stopped. They surveyed the carnage at the other end of the hallway and motioned to the standing nurses and doctors, indicating to them to get behind the new group.

One of the women in black armor with a red crowned skull on her shoulder opened the door to the room Captain Phoenix Alexandra took shelter in.

“Quickly! Come with us if you value your life.” Was the raven-haired warrior’s only words.

Dead crew, but for a handful that jumped overboard or put off on longboats.

All to a single ship that out-sailed, out-gunned, out-fought the ship-of-the-line of His Majesty’s Navy.

They were adrift for three days, rowing like madmen against the ocean current before they got to an island.

The curses of having no navigator or maps.

The navigator, captain and the talented helmsman that knew how to read the sea better than anyone were all obliterated in the lopsided battle with a crew of child-pirates.

A cannonball cares not for who fired it or where it goes. Random chance, the will of gods, demons and a roll of the infinite dice of the Lord God determine a sailor’s life in battle.

And in politics, those that administer care little for God’s Will or Random Chance.

There was a ship lost, that was the question that the minister wanted answered from the only surviving officer of the Worcester.

And “Will of God” was not an acceptable answer.

There! The summons came.

Dressed in his military best, he entered into the chambers and walked where the squire led him.

His heels made an echo on the fitted stone floor as he walked down the hall into the chambers of proprietary governor’s office.

His Highness Gurdman Stonecutter, Governor For the Virginia Colony stood in the middle of the Great Room that served as his chambers. Tall, he was over six-feet and four inches tall and towered over everyone in the court and at ten-stone, he weighed less than most men.

Informally, his peirage called him “Longstrider”, something that he did not object to. hahaha

Archebald Whyte, late of the Worchester stood respectfully off to the side as told by the Governor’s secretary, until the Governor turned and addressed him.

“Tell me a story, Quartermaster. What happened to the King’s ship I gave to Captain Willim?” The Governor said as he sat in a large chair, built just for him. The secretary poured a large cup of wine for the Governor, leaving Quartermaster Whyte standing, without refreshment.

Tongs and hammers, wood and copper, iron and wood, the ship took shape in the backwater of the great bay, hidden by the local geography, the ship grew in its lethal shape for a lethal design.

The hull was knife edged, a keel that resembled the fin of the largest porpoise in the world’s oceans. The Blackfish grew in shape and deadly purpose. Conn O’Danu paced as he directed the carpenters to follow the measurements and drawings to the bitter-end of each page. There would be no gaps, no errors. Conn used green, live oak for the frame and hull of the new ship, stout construction to the extreme. No guesswork allowed, each measurement was made by standard marks on flat sticks and small knots on cords.

This pleased Conn, this oak of the new land demonstrated itself as a resilient wood and made for the tightest construction he ever envisioned possible.

In the course of the construction, the men and women adults felt need to build a ship, the urge to build came from Keegan, who reassembled the crew of children that had returned home. Their mission, the small ones had decided, return to the islands in the south and rescue their friends, mothers, fathers and all their families that remained.

The children, parents found, while still children in their bodies, had matured into adults far before their time. The New Model Army took them as babes needing their mothers for slights and scrapes, the children returned as pirates that the naval powers feared. Pint-sized warriors willing to fight and take wounds, to bleed for each other and what they felt as a righteous mission. Mothers and fathers, sadly, took months to learn the precious innocent children were gone forever, replaced by hunters and legends. They were threats to all on the ocean.

The cruelty of the Empires of the world had taught them how to sail and fight. Now, they were punishers of the sea, and to the sea they would return until that which the Empire had stolen were all returned.

Copper and iron metal heated and hammered in place. Diarmuid An Dubh and Nial Gabham, the two talented blacksmiths of the village, made connections to other artisans of metals and the powers of Hephaestus, forged with imagination the plates of copper they attached to the hull of the ship. A ship which they hid in the back-waters of the bay.

Ideas from the boy who brought the children home, copper scales nailed on the bottom of the ship’s hull. Copper nails held the dinner-plate sized copper ellipse shaped scales in place. Brass and bronze nails driven in measured distances by carpenters and craftsmen. The builders who followed what Keegan O’Danu and Dana, who the O’Danu’s had adopted as one of their own, showed where to drive the metal spikes into the wood.

Under the shade of a nearby tree, as word spread, children gathered by ones and twos. They were returning, time for retribution was at hand.

Mothers with fear in their hearts, tried to pull these children who gathered in the clearing. Children, those that had been lost and then returned, who still carried a fire in them that frightened most adults.

Such anger, taught by the Empires of the sea and this New World that they colonized. Taken for slavery and pleasure, a life was worth less than the sweat it took to pull a knife from a sheath.

Fathers pulled on children who turned and looked at the patriarchs in the eye. In the child’s eye, an unwavering fury danced in each of their hearts. The souls of a generation pushed beyond civilized limits, filled instead with the single thought.

Retrieve that which was theirs.

Parents words of denial and demands, spoken of in angered whispers as families tried to rebuild. But no one denied that each family was still rent and torn with missing members.

These were children who learned a mission. Their first mission was to come home.

A new call to arms, a new mission, flames of deep, unremitting anger sparkled in youthful eyes. Confidence that only the young had, and a fury taught equalled only by the devil himself at those who raided their villages.

The followers of Cromwell, the devil of all the crimes against this group of children that despised the soldiers in red and the Rump Parliament who followed after Pride’s Purge. The efforts of a few had instilled such anger in a whole people.

And the growing Empire successfully angered two groups of people to that point in its history.

The Great Scots of the North and the Highlands and the entire Hibernian isle.

The Governor of the colony could not know of the return of a crew of children on a ship that was like no other.

In time, despair would settle over the hearts of Governors and Ministers alike in future days as rumors of the hell-ship, namedBlackfish, a fast and lethal warship that sailed the waters of the West Indies came to their ears.

Keegan and the boys of the crew laughed over a joke that Colm had made about the ship they had just stolen from the Navy Royale when the mistress of the guns, Granuaile walked up and punched Keegan on the shoulder as hard as she could. Those that knew the relationship laughed as the Captain groaned while he rubbed his shoulder.

“That’s never going to heal, you know!” He complained while following her across the deck. “Granuile, wait. There is someone I want you to meet.” motioning to the newest of the crew to come close, Keegan introduced Dana to Granuaile asking her to get him fed.

She took the skinny lad to the cook and had him eat his fill. Then returned to Keegan and complained that the boy stank of gunpowder, sweat, grease and general filth, which the Master of the Ship found in great humor. An unwashed body it seemed to give the Captain of the ship an idea.

The unwashed body that offended Granuaile was one that she would scrub within an inch of his life.

“Hmm… Well, as a new member of the ship, he needs an initiation, maybe.” Dash noted. “Perhaps a good cleaning as one would scrub a cannon?”

Granuaile never showed any affection to any boy, but she would stand next to Keegan as he led or called orders, often she competed for his attentions with the first officer, the small and intense Angelcries.

“You want him cleaned like I keep my guns? We will wash him. I will not allow him below as he is now, he reeks and you will have a mutiny on your hands if he stays below with us to sleep.” Granuaile told her Captain. “We’ll clean him up after he finishes eating. He will be as clean as a newborn!”

Angelcries sighed as she watched the newest buccaneer eat from a distance.

“I do not think they fed him in all the time he was on their ship.”

“Get some buckets and scrub brushes.” Keegan motioned to Iollan and Colm, nodding. “After he eats? We have a new member of the crew to clean.”

“This will be a challenge, but fun.” Colm laughed with a wink.

After he had eaten, Dana protested with all his voice as the boys along with Granuaile and the boys and several girls stripped Dana down to his underwear, pinching their noses at the smell that was under the unwashed clothing was worse than he trailed behind him when he walked. Granuaile dragged the blond, smelly body towards a large tub, and the group scrubbed the child until he sparkled in the warm summer night air.

Wearing new clothes that they gathered from chests of leather and silks they had collected, Dana Surya stood and smiled as he looked in a small hand-held mirror.

“Ooh! I look good! But –” Dana turned around. “never, ever, ever do that again!” Dana growled as he looked in the mirror. “I could have washed myself.”

“Hardly…” Granuaile shook her head. “You had powder in your hair that we had to scrub three times to get clean!”

Rubbing his still tingling scalp. “Ya, I felt it. Did ya have to scrub so hard?”

“We’ll never lose you Master Dana,” Keegan said. “Your hair is as pretty as mine.”

Iollian made sleeping arrangements with the Captain and first officer Angelcries. Normally up to four children in a full-sized hammock. Dana shared the his with Iollan until he was comfortable.

Angelcries often threatened the small blond for his snoring. In his first days often he coughed up black mud from his days in the holds of the English powder stores.

Months passed and Dana Surya, the saved boy of the ships, showed new knots that he had learned from the English that could be tied more quickly and were stronger than the ones they learned with the pirates.

Quietly one evening, after a month at sea, Keegan talked with Dana as they sat on the rails of the quarterdeck and the boy-captain explained his name from when the first pirate could not pronounce or spell his real name to the alias he now used as a family name.

“I am known as Dash MacDíoltas to the English. In Irish Gaelic, I am Dash, Son of Revenge. I have sworn to undo all that the English has done to my family or make those cry for all the tears I have shed after they killed my Mamo and Seanathair.” He sighed. “But my real name is Keegan O’Danu.”

Dana looked down at his hands.

“I never knew my parents. I only remember being on a ship carrying cargo or ball for cannon. That is how I learned to count, so I can stack a full count in racks. I have always been alone.” Dana said softly.. “They called me Dana, for a man from Denmark. And Surya because my hair is the color of the sun.”

Keegan paused and took a deep breath, nodding, understanding the part that the world took from the newest of the crew could never be replaced. But as someone other than a captain, he could do one thing.

Sighing slowly. “Dana, one thing I know about is being alone. I have no brothers or sisters and when we find my Da’, you will be my brother and we — you and I — will no longer be alone.”

Dana hugged on his Captain and brother. Keegan told Dana of the stories of Bradan. After nights of such stories by all the crew that told of their lost friends, Dana knew that he was never again would be a lost boy. Dash the Captain who was also Keegan the Brother gave his word that he would never let that happen again.

Like this:

After Captain Morgan talked with Dash, they ate a full with grateful hearts in the room as the clock ticked the hours away, boys just finished their thirds of meat and roasted vegetables when Captain Morgan re-entered the room.

“Nearly as good as Quilan cooks?” Morgan laughed as the boys nodded.

“The meat was great!” Dash said with a smile. “Cooked over an open flame instead of boiled to death in a tub.”

“And it didn’t melt my tongue!” Bradan referred to some of the over-spiced meals he had eaten of late.

The Captain kissed Mary with passion, slid his arms around her waist and pulled her into a tight hug.

“We are going to the “Bleeding Stump” pub. I’ll return before sundown. Set places for tonight’s meal for eight extra seats — we have guests! Five boys and three girls.”

“Come young Master’s! We have someone we need to meet. Maybe two or three!” He bellowed as he strode to the door, followed by Dash and Bradan. Mary laughed at the three of them. They were a sight and she wondered if the world was ready for that team of rogues.

The trio walked down the small street to the harbor where they entered a ramshackle construct that could be anything, save for the shingle of wood that someone painted with severed and bleeding appendage.

“Henry!” The group inside called in unison, it was obvious, Henry was home. The boys looked at each other and grinned.

“Sit, sit!” the man behind the counter looked as if he had been born before God made hair. His bald head shined without a single strand. But the tattoo’s on it and the great smile belied the glint in his eyes. He missed nothing in his range of vision.

Morgan motioned to Dash and Bradan as they sat around a table that was suddenly cleared for the trio. Clearly this was “his” table.

“I ha’ wee small beers for the young’un’s. The water is even brackish for drinking around here.” The barkeeper said in a basso-profundo voice.

Bradan raised his hand “I’ll take an ale.”

The barkeeper, gave an amused look for a moment, then said, “NO!” in a voice that felt like a small earthquake had rumbled through.

“I’ll nae have regurgitation from some bairns on me floor. You drink some wee small beers. Good for you and nae put your face in the dirt.”

Small beers in the area were a brewed without the effects of heavy alcoholic drinks.

“Rum, Henry?” The the big man sat a mug down in front of the Captain. “There are people looking for you the last few days. Couple of women, beautiful as angels.” Gerris coughed with a wink. “Angels with large knives.”

“Aye, yer ears would be cut off if Mary caught ye. Well, ye’ll get yer chance t’meet these women soon enough. One of them is God-Wants. She’s Master of the ship…” Gerris laughed,

“The Firebrand, I know.” Morgan laughed with Gerris.

Then he turned to the boys, Morgan told the story of who this woman was with twinkling eyes as he rememberd the events of the day.

“Anne is her first name, you’d do well to remember that. She attempted to disembowel a man when I met her a few years ago.” Henry nodded, “She did quite well, too, until her opponent’s friends broke them up. I believe she would make a fine man if God ever chose to create one like her.”

Gerris laughed at the old story that he had heard often before and it amused the barkeeper as he watched the young men react.

“Well ye’ll nae ha’ ta wait long. Her longboat is still tied up at the docks. She ‘n’ Jacquotte Delahaye are still ashore.”

“Best man to have barter anything for you.” Henry said as Gerris walked away, “He bartered his way into this place and has done well since. He served on the “Liberté” as an able bodied-seaman. They had foul weather and nearly broke apart after a barbaric expedition down from New France in the north, near Halifax. They came in dismasted and bailing like madmen just to stay afloat. The ship went under at the mooring a few hours after they tied up and came ashore.”

Dash and Bradan listened in rapt attention.

“Why doesn’t he return home? By the sound of him, he is from the Highlands.” Dash asked after a moment.

“Indeed, He is a Scot from that area. He was a sailor on shore leave, at a pub where trouble happened and someone killed a man in a fight. Don’t know how it happened, but somehow he got the blame. He can’t leave for home, he left his family when he was but half his age now. No more than a boy, I’d reckon.” Henry answered.

“Morgan!” A woman’s voice carried in from the street. “Henry Morgan you besotted Welshman, are you here?”

“Well,” He whispered to Dash and Bradan, “One of our guests have arrived. I had hoped to talk with Christopher Myngs before she showed up, but I have no luck there it seems.” Henry chuckled and stood up to meet the new guests.

If the first woman came through the door was blond and beautiful for her age, she was old, almost elderly — At least nineteen or twenty. Almost twice Dash or Bradan’s ages. The two boys froze in their seats as the intense blue eyes locked on Captain Morgan and she made a beeline right to him. The next woman through the door was unlike they had seen before. Dark red curly hair, steely blue eyes and skin the color of dark-honey.

“Oh Henry! You have held out on us, trading in beautiful men now it seems?” Said Anne, who sat next to Dash and ran her fingers over his head, “This one is beautiful, and this dark-ginger hair!” She was looked the boys over like they was a tasty morsel of food.

“You have all your men, Anne, you are just plain spoiled. You can’t have just anything you want.”

“Henry! I can and I will! They sent us away, I can have anything I want! I will not back down, ever.” Hissed Anne in a dangerously quiet way, “You have need for these youths? Are these all you have?”

Dash and Bradan were felt the fear of prey that was the next meal that this woman was about to have.

“You are a beauty!” Jacquotte smiled as she sat next to Bradan, “How long do you have left in service, boy?”

“We are free.” Dash spoke up. “We serve no one. We are working our way back home and no one will stop us.”

Dash paused when the two women had looked at each other with wide eyes and started to laugh.

Jacquotte smiled wide as she ran her fingers through Bradan’s hair.

“Ooh, young man, I would keep you safe in my home forever.” Then the smile turned to Dash and she looked into his emerald-green eyes. “Baby-boy, you serve someone somewhere. Where do you call home?” Jacquotte asked.

“Henry, I want this boy and his friend. They are needing a woman’s touch, I swear!” Anne injected.

“Ladies! Ladies, keep your hands off. These boys are just here for a visit and as they have said, they are free to do as they wish. E’en a couple of beauties as y’selves must respect the fact they only just now approach manhood.” Henry admonished the two women.

Bradan stared at Jacquotte, his eyes frozen on her eyes and his ears bright red from the attentions of the woman buccaneer who men would kill to have such attention paid to them.

“You have never seen a woman who wears breeches?” Jacquotte’s long fingers ran through the red-faced boy’s hair. “I can turn you into a man who would command fear and respect.”

“Will my skin become dark like this if I stay here?” Bradan asked, “I have seen servants from Africa, but none like you. You are much lighter.”

“I’m what you might call ‘Black-Irish’, me mum was from Clonmel and me Dad, a French buccaneer from Haiti and he was fond of her as you can tell. One day the Spanish came when I was out at the market, they killed everyone on the mountain.” A far-away look filled the eyes of the red-headed woman pirate. “I never knew what they were looking for.”

Her eyes focused again suddenly, “I took to the sea and have not been back to there since. I’ll put a hole in any ship I find flying a Spanish flag.”

Even Henry had stopped to listen, never had he heard this woman’s story.

“I’m not of any country, only the sea is my home. I have survived through more than most men. I know of whispers that they call me behind my back for when I hid among the dead when the Spanish were looking for my skin.”

“What do they call you?” Bradan asked.

“Back-from-the-dead-red.” Jacquotte laughed softly. “I like to see the faces of the Spanish devils that wiped out my family, left me to care for my simple-minded brother until they returned, and then they killed him for no reason. Now, when we take their ships, I’m looking for one captain and when I find him I will use more red blood from his heart to paint with.”

Bradan boggled at the dangerous way she said it. Softly, but with the rage of a Sidhe that his father would tell him about. A raging spirit that might lull you in with soft sounds and destroy you in a moment.

Jacquotte was a pirate that the Spanish feared more than they had fear of an entire navy of men and cannon.

“I’m in love.” Bradan whispered to Dash that made Dash laugh into his tankard of small beer and he choked as suds covered his face.

“You made my beer come out my nose!” Dash complained. Which made Bradan laugh even harder.

Henry looked around, several men were walked towards the pub from down the road. He could see out to the end of the street from his vantage point — it was the reason he liked this table so well. He watched the men with a sharp eye, he recognized one of the older men, a fellow Captain that he had sent a message to some time before.

It looked good if Abraham Blauvelt had responded. Henry and Abraham had served together under the command of Myngs when they had managed a hugely successful raid along the Spanish Main.